Good Nature
by Sister Coyote
Summary: They wrote each other letters for years. Larsa/Penelo/Vaan. Poly. Fluff, new relationship.


Penelo's letters were brisk, chatty, full of gossip—short, but frequent. Many of her letters skimmed bright and rapid over the trade runs she and Vaan made in their new ship (which they christened the _Reks_), focusing more on the colorful characters they met or the mishaps they encountered than what they were actually doing. Larsa could tell that she was trying to make him smile, and yet it worked anyway.

When she apprenticed herself to Fran for six months, to learn more about how to keep her small ship in good order, her letters filled suddenly with technical jargon. It was nearly incomprehensible and not of itself very interesting—Larsa's appetite for knowledge extended only sketchily to mechanics—but her delight in the subject leaped off the page. So too did her worship of Fran, who was not an easy person to admire; reading between the lines he could tell that Fran explained seldom and expected one explanation to be remembered forever, and that she was even sparser with praise. But Penelo was full of exuberance about the wealth of her knowledge, and also her dignity and her strength.

She was never exuberant about Vaan—she was dry, affectionate, often full of complaints; she referred to him comparatively seldom, considering that they worked and lived together. Larsa was not himself surprised. A fish did not comment extensively on the presence of water. Vaan himself never wrote separate letters, although sometimes he would scrawl something on the bottom or the back of Penelo's letters—never more than a few lines, and sometimes simply a long wobbly arrow extending from some comment about him, protesting "she's exaggerating." Larsa turned them around in the lamplight, doing his best to decipher his loose-jointed scrawl.

He wrote back less frequently, but his letters were longer. He wrote very little about national or international politics, which was the substance of his day from morning well into night. Instead, he told her about the seasons, the birds he saw in the gardens, the clothes that were currently in fashion at court. (Penelo seemed to like that: not because she was herself fashionable, but indeed for quite the opposite reason. "Silk lace slippers?" she wrote back. "Really? Don't they tear awful easy? And wouldn't those parasols take quite a lot of bird feathers?") He wrote to her about those things because she was the only one who really wanted to listen to them. A hundred courtiers would sit with a practiced look of attention on their face to hear him discuss . . . anything, economic theory or chocobo breeding or what he ate for breakfast—but it would be an attempt to win his favor. At the heart it would still be politics, whatever the surface topic. Penelo—and through her, Vaan—were the only ones, apart from Basch, with whom he could talk without real ulterior motive; and it was difficult to persuade Basch to unbend his honor enough to discourse. Basch was his mentor, vassal, protector, responsibility.

He wished to see them, but he was too busy; he had too many responsibilities (and they were heavy, though he accepted them willingly; it weighed on him, the fate of his country). Basch sighed, and shook his head, and said, "You will do your country no good if you wear yourself to exhaustion."

"'"Why must you skulk so close to the ground?" said the serpent to the dire rat,'" Larsa said, quoting the proverb. "You are one to talk, my lord guardian."

Basch's smile tugged up to one side, and he said, "Is it not the duty of a guard, to protect his charge from dangers he does not spare himself? Gods willing, you will rule another sixty years. Pace yourself."

But there was always some task that required his attention—the treaty to sign with Rozzaria, the proposals for a new aqueduct system, the tariff regulations. So he did not go, and did not go, and then, unbidden, they came instead.

"Visitors in your receiving room," Basch said, and removed his helm. (He would be called by the name _Gabranth_ his whole life, and yet Larsa could not think of him so, though he used that name where anyone else could hear; he had grown up with Gabranth ever a shadow at his back, and though Basch and his brother were much alike in appearance, they were not wholly alike in manner or nature.)

"Very well," he said. "I have an hour free—"

The way Basch was smiling, a little, should have warned him; but he was tired. He opened the door, looked up, and then Penelo was on him, saying "Larsa! —You're so tall!"

"Am I?" he asked, bemused, as she hugged him hard—few people touched him, in Archadia; he was the emperor, after all—and then let him go. "Still no taller than you." He still had not quite registered it, somehow: Penelo, here, and lurking behind her looking as if he did not know what to say and did not want to make it obvious that he did not know what to say, Vaan.

"Still, you've grown," she said, and then giggled. "That was a stupid thing to say, wasn't it?"

"I think what you were looking for," Vaan said dryly, "is, 'Hi, Larsa. It's good to see you.'"

"It is good to see you, as well," Larsa said. "Both of you."

Penelo beamed.

They hadn't changed much, either of them—Vaan was filling out a bit, and Penelo wore her hair up now, in a knot that presumably kept it out of her way when she was deep in the belly of their ship. He was of a height with her, which was a more meaningful measure of his growth than the records kept by his personal physician.

"It was our idea," Vaan said, "but Basch helped a lot."

"We hid the ship under the Gate Bridge," Penelo said, laughing, "on the edge of the city, you know? And then came in by the sewers—"

"—which brought back memories, let me tell you—"

"—and then he helped sneak us in."

There was food on the table already; usually his chambers contained a snack, cheese and fruit and a mild fruit wine, but someone had seen to it this time that there were three glasses next to the carafe rather than one. Larsa poured three glasses. "I must say, neither of you smells much of sewers. Not that I am giving complaint, mind."

Vaan took one glass and handed the other to Penelo. "We took advantage of your baths," he said. "Five kinds of scented soap? You're going to go so soft—"

"—says the man who swears by silk underwear, Vaan, honestly, of all the habits to pick up in Balfonheim Port—" Her tone was mocking, but Larsa did not miss the way she bumped him with her hip, affectionate.

"—they're _comfortable_—"

"Then you shall have to keep me from becoming soft," Larsa interrupted. "Perhaps I should see how rough your life is," he added, and regretted it when Vaan's mouth curled up and Penelo squeaked.

"You should!" she said. "You should come with us some time. We'd love to have you. You—"

_Could not possibly spare the time,_ he thought, but did not say. They looked so pleased that he ached, suddenly.

"Tell me how you have been," he said, as they nibbled on grapes and sliced pears and cheese, and sipped a wine which had probably cost more than all the jewelry that marched up the edge of Penelo's ear (clearly Vaan was not the only one to have picked up a fashion habit from the city of pirates). They started in at once, tumbling over each other and interrupting in a way that at some times seemed like an argument and at others like a practiced dance, Penelo filling in details for Vaan, Vaan dragging the story back on track when Penelo wandered far afield.

The strangest thing of it, the most alien thing, was the good nature between them. At court he saw thinly-veiled aggression and icy politeness and sweetness that as often as not masked deep deceit. Penelo and Vaan acted as though they liked one another, simply and honestly. And him.

The night grew late, and though Larsa was too polite to yawn, Vaan was not. "It's getting late," he said. "We should go."

"So soon?" Larsa asked, despite himself.

Penelo grinned. "We'll be back tomorrow," she said. "We didn't come all this way to spend just an hour with you."

He pressed a hand to his heart and inclined his head. "I am relieved." He leaned forward to put his wineglass back on the table, and did not miss it when Penelo glanced at Vaan and then gave him a kick in the ankle.

He was nonetheless quite surprised when Vaan leaned forward, too, and kissed him. Awkwardly, as though he was not quite sure what he was doing, but that was quite all right because Larsa was himself at a loss, for the first time in a very long time. Vaan's mouth was warm and a little clumsy, but then he tilted his head and it went better. Quite a bit better. Without really intending to, Larsa touched his gloved fingertips to Vaan's throat, and wished he was not wearing gloves.

Vaan pulled away, blushing.

"We thought it would be clearer what we meant if he kissed you first," Penelo said, and he thought, _Oh, you are a pirate, as much as he is,_ before she kissed him, too, her mouth soft against his. Her hair smelled of sandalwood. Her hand on his wrist, on the crescent of skin between sleeve and gloves, was callused, short-nailed, warm.

"We'll see you tomorrow," Vaan said, heading for the—balcony? Penelo grinned at him, and then went to catch up, her arm sliding around Vaan's waist.

"I shall anticipate it with pleasure," Larsa said.


End file.
